Trail Tech Vapor for '97 FE 600

Hi -

I'm currently in the process of trying to get my berg back to being road-legal and one of the requirements is that it has a speedo. Bought the bike recently and it was road-registered in Japan so no prob doing this in NZ as long as it has the right bits and pieces. Been looking at buying a Trail Tech Vapor, but not really sure if they make a kit for the fe 600. Currently there's some weird bike computer setup on it that doesn't work.

It's my understanding that the Vapor can still be adapted for other models the kit was not designed for, but I would prefer to avoid the hassle and just get the right kit. Has anyone here fitted one to their fe 600? If so, what model (kit number) was it?

Thanks - Moki

The main difference in the kits is the speedo pickup & its mounting arrangement and the the engine temp pickup style. You need a kit with an in-line water temp pickup.

As for the speedo pickup, it is not hard to work out a neater arrangement than many of the original Trailtech ones. I mounted mine on the right side in the space where the old cable drive was.

When I got mine it was heaps cheaper to get one from the US than to buy one in Oz. Even with the slipped dollar it would be worth checking out. There are lots of good dealers for them on US eBay.com.

I put a couple of pix of the fitted dashboard in my gallery - the link below.

BundyBear said:

The main difference in the kits is the speedo pickup & its mounting arrangement and the the engine temp pickup style. You need a kit with an in-line water temp pickup.

As for the speedo pickup, it is not hard to work out a neater arrangement than many of the original Trailtech ones. I mounted mine on the right side in the space where the old cable drive was.

When I got mine it was heaps cheaper to get one from the US than to buy one in Oz. Even with the slipped dollar it would be worth checking out. There are lots of good dealers for them on US eBay.com.

I put a couple of pix of the fitted dashboard in my gallery - the link below.

Click to expand...

Hey thanks for the info Brad. I have just started looking at some US ebay traders, but have yet to find one that ship for reasonable rates to NZ. I have family in the states so might just have them ship one over. Had a look at the dash- very nice indeed. Looks to be something you made rather than bought? I take it you're using the alu guard with Vapor? Cheers Karl

hey Moki,
I put a vapor on my 99 fe400 it works great. i got the kit for a yamaha tt i believe, when i ordered mine directly from trailtec they swapped the air cooled sensor for the yamaha(goes around the spark plug) for the water cooled sensor. The only mod I had to do was on the dashboard i got with it. I had to file the holes bigger on the bracket to fit the handlebar mounts. water and rpm sensors mounted normally. the speedo sensor is the trickiest. is that a word? LOL. i didn't do any filing or grinding on the sensor as some have done here. The vapor speedo sensor for the tt model is smaller and a different shape than the ktm model, I ended up just tie wrapping the sensor to the inside of the lower fork next to the brake rotor. works great ! only thing is, you need to keep an eye out that the sensor doesn't roll around the fork to the point it quits picking up the magnet bolt you'll install on the rotor. You'll notice when it does.... It has only happened to me once and it was when i was off road so it wasn't a big deal, you can roll it back around easily.but it seems to stay in place on the road. I thought i had some pics of it in my gallery, but i must have removed them. give me your email and i'll take new pics and send them to you. But i love the vapor, more info in the manuel on using the features would be nice as the manual is very vague. Just my opinion tho.....

One thing I can't for the life of me see is why they did not include a battery voltage display in the Vapor - it's hooked directly up to it!

I'm in the process of making a small board that drives the fourth indicator light as a battery warning. The intention is to have it come on steady when the voltage is low enough to indicate the battery is not being charged by the bike and to have it flash if the regulator dies (again!) and the voltage goes high enough to blow up the battery.

If I ever get it to work I'll post details.

I forgot too. If you do make your own mount for the speedo pickup, try to keep it and its magnet as close to the centre of the wheel as practical & tidy. This makes the time longer that the little magnetic reed switch in the pickup has to close each rotation of the wheel.

Mine works perfectly on the 17" wheels to over 100mph, and the magnet rotates around about 75mm circle.

Both my friends have had trouble getting it reliable when mounted toward the outside of a 320mm disc. The magnet is near the sensor for only a few degrees of each rotation. When mounted like this you have to be careful to get the magnet to pass as close to and lined up as best possible to the sensor.

I don't think that's quite right Brad!

The tangential velocity changes, but the angular velocity is constant, and hence the time is the same no matter where the magnet and switch are on the radius of the wheel.

Think about it.

Also the 'space' that the switch and magnet are in proximity is longer as you get closer to the centre of the wheel as the tangentail velocity is less. Hence the further away the pickup is from the centre, the slightly longer the switch has to recover.

Steve

steve said:

I don't think that's quite right Brad!

The tangential velocity changes, but the angular velocity is constant, and hence the time is the same no matter where the magnet and switch are on the radius of the wheel.

Think about it.

Also the 'space' that the switch and magnet are in proximity is longer as you get closer to the centre of the wheel as the tangentail velocity is less. Hence the further away the pickup is from the centre, the slightly longer the switch has to recover.

Click to expand...

Sorry Steve. I must beg to differ & ask you to think about it as well, Sir.

The sensor doesn't really give a rat's what the tangential velocity is. What is does care about is whether the magnet is close enough to it to pull in the reed switch - probably within about 15mm either side or 30mm of distance around the arc of the magnet rotation. It corresponds to the "on" time of the signal. Note this distance does not change with change in radius of the magnet/sensor from the wheel centre.

When the magnet goes around a 75mm circle the reed switch is pulled on for about 12% of the time. When it goes around a 250mm circle it is on for less than 4% of the time. ie Same pulse frequency, lower pulse duty cycle.

I agree that reed switches are usually slower to recover or turn off than they are to turn on, but even at a 75mm circle, the recovery time is seven times the on time! Does not even rate as a consideration!

Moki said:

Brad..... Had a look at the dash- very nice indeed. Looks to be something you made rather than bought? I take it you're using the alu guard with Vapor?

Click to expand...

Karl - It was a project I did on a rapid prototyping machine we have at work. If your bike has the same headlight mask as mine and the same standard spider-looking original speedo & front turn indicator mount, then it should fit straight on your bike as well. Get back if you think it worth worry to try to fit one & I'll make it next chance I get. You'd have to decide what colour you wanted though... See the pix attached of the dashboard. The hole on the left is for the battery charger socket.

It does not fit the aluminium guard from Trailtech. The one I used is another standard option plastic surround from Trailtech that clips on over the front of the Vapor. There is one on Oz eBay at the moment you can see, and they seem readily available. I used it because it has the four indicator lights for turn signals, high beam & (hopefully) battery charge.

I installed the cheaper trailtech a couple of years ago, it wasnt a big deal. Recently I installed a new pickup and mounted it to my brake caliper as per the instructions it came with. I used to have it strapped to my fork with silicone and a large hose clamp, a little magnet is epoxied into my disc brake..Works nice, my 98 FE 600 is street legal however it came with a plate from Michigan. I transfered everything to Illinois no problem. (maybe the Governor had something to do with that!) I installed parts of a baja kit and some cheap turnsignals along with the horn and mirror. It works ok around town, but it is hell on my knobbies! It is not my local commuter, just my dual sport for Michigan trails.

Sorry Brad,

I suspect that we are perhaps trying to say the same thing. We probably need a white board and a beer or three to resolve this. Of course if it could ever get to the centre it would never switch off, which was I guess the point I was trying to make, so don't get it too close to the axle. How close is too close? Dunno! LoL

Cheers
Steve

PS the Vapor on my wife's KLX works great except for the temp gauge. Seems it is dependant on the wiring and I had to lengthen it to get it to fit neatly and the lengthening seems to have corrupted the signal. Also it, albeit rarely, resets the tacho spark signal to a 4 stroke from the necessary 2 stroke, ie 1 spark per revolution which can confuse her.

steve said:

....the temp gauge. Seems it is dependant on the wiring and I had to lengthen it to get it to fit neatly and the lengthening seems to have corrupted the signal. Also it, albeit rarely, resets the tacho spark signal to a 4 stroke from the necessary 2 stroke, ie 1 spark per revolution which can confuse her.

Click to expand...

I was surprised when I saw my Vapor that none of the wiring was shielded - especially the water temp and spark pickup wires. It should make the signals more susceptible to electrical noise. Maybe you are seeing the effects of that?

You also seem to be seeing memory corruption in the the resetting of programmed values? Have you ever noticed any other variables other than pulses per rev going haywire as well? We have had lots of problems at work with a small industrial PC mounted in a truck doing exactly the same thing. Variables stored in flash memory get corrupted and the thing loses its brains. The supplier of the PC claims repeatedly that it is due to spikes in the supply of power to it. We have changed the main DC power supply to the unit and added an extra power filter - that they must use when the unit is used on ships for some reason. I think it has something to do with Lloyds. Anyway, so far it seems to have fixed the corruption problems.

What I am trying to say is that maybe the KLX has particularly noisy electrics - motorbike regulators are notorious for generating noise if the connection to the battery is not good and/or the battery is not in reasonable knick. If you cant find anything amiss around there, then fitting a small supply filter on the power to the Vapor, and shielding the sensor wires where they run down the headstock might help.

All the best & merry :x-mas: , Brad


(PS. If the speedo pickup sense distance was exactly 15mm and the sensor was exactly in line with the pickup, I make it that having the sensor mounted 10.61mm from the centre of the axle would give you the optimum 50% duty cycle on the signal. Less than 7.5mm would give you 100% which won't work at all. Since it would be physically impossible to mount it any closer than about 15mm, and the sense distance is a bit variable anyway, I don't reckon there is a practical "too close" position... Now I'm aranoid: )

It only seems to be the tacho that loses its memory..........Just occasionally, and as I'm not riding it......

The bike came standard with a tacho and it has actually been quite a good thing for her, getting her to keep the revs over 4k has done wonders for her momentum. Previously she was changing up at about that.

I initially set the shift lights up so that the yellow came on at 4k and told her to keep it lit.

I/we live without the temp gauge. It'd be nice to have, but it has good sized radiators and a thermo fan, and a big battery and charging system so as long as the coolant is inside its no problem.

Interesting stuff, electrical noise. I used to spend some time in and around our power stations and switch yards and you can get some strange things happening to electrical stuff in there.

Steve

BundyBear said:

Moki said:

Brad..... Had a look at the dash- very nice indeed. Looks to be something you made rather than bought? I take it you're using the alu guard with Vapor?

Click to expand...

Karl - It was a project I did on a rapid prototyping machine we have at work. If your bike has the same headlight mask as mine and the same standard spider-looking original speedo & front turn indicator mount, then it should fit straight on your bike as well. Get back if you think it worth worry to try to fit one & I'll make it next chance I get. You'd have to decide what colour you wanted though... See the pix attached of the dashboard. The hole on the left is for the battery charger socket.

It does not fit the aluminium guard from Trailtech. The one I used is another standard option plastic surround from Trailtech that clips on over the front of the Vapor. There is one on Oz eBay at the moment you can see, and they seem readily available. I used it because it has the four indicator lights for turn signals, high beam & (hopefully) battery charge.

Click to expand...

Hi Brad,

Very nice indeed. If it's okay with you I'll give you a shout when I finally get a vapor. I'm struggling with some CDI/Coil or Stator issue at the moment and I'm saving coin for a likely replacement for one or the other.

-Karl

Karl. I've got a spare, 2nd-hand CDI/coil I bought from another UHE member a while ago. I was told it came off a running bike. Sing out if yours ends up being crook and you get stuck getting one.